In the house I lived in 3 years ago, I had lightning hits twice and both times it blew the controller, power supply, X10 stuff, etc. off the wall and left black marks where they used to be. At my new home all the control cables go through a junction box right outside my home. I had purchased some gas-discharge arrestors and was planning on locating them there; and hopefully stop the high voltage PRIOR to entering the home.
Also, on this controller I take suction of the water from the lake, hence I will need a pump control circuit. I plan to treat it the same as a valve circuit (except the timing of course; it has to be on when any of the valves are programmed to come on) and then add a relay at the pump with a 24 VAC coil and large enough contacts to handle the 2 HP pump. Thoughts?
Yea, Nelson also stated a need for a pump controller.· In his case the pump ran too long and pumped the shallow well dry.· The pump heated up and may have caused damage to the coil.
Thus we may want to add the following to the design:
1) A·"pump switch"·that can be used to control a relay that powers the pump.· This would power up when it needed to irrigate the lawn and power down when it doesn't need it.··The problem I see with this design is that the pump may be used for things other than irrigation (i.e. wash the car or household water).· In that case you would not be able to use that feature. .... Hmmm. I guess if it were just to was the car you could put a manual override on it to leave the pump on for an hour or so (depends·how clean you want your car!)·
2) One of the pins on the SX could also be connected to a water pressure sensor.· The SX would constantly monitor the pressure while the pump switch was active.· If the pressure dropped below a point for more than a minute it would deactivate the pump relay and sleep for one hour and try again.
3) The lightning problem does concern me though.· If I were using just a $30 home depot sprinkler I would risk it.· But here we are talking about a serious amount of hand assembled electronics that would be a pain to replace..... I need to do more research on this.· Jim, how much were those gas-discharge arrestors and where do you get them?
As my Embedded Computer Programming and Design class is fast approaching, I'll get back into the saddle. Jan 08 I need to write a bunch of tutorials for the class so I'll clear out the cobwebs and get cracking on this. As I seem to have simple problems (like mounting a chip on a perf board and being able to program it) I think my new design methodology may center around Parallax's prototype board that plugs into a daughter board and that way I can eliminate problems with resonators, etc. (grin).
I'm sure your probably busy working with your "Embedded Computer Programming and Design class", but any updates on this project?
I'm working on something similar (sprinkler, lighting, and data acquisition system) however my water valves will be addressable using a half duplex RS485 network. I've installed a 1" water loop and an electrical conduit containing a cat 5 cable and a 3 conductor 16 gauge cable around my home. Still landscaping so I don't have a definite plan for my sprinkler system. But with the above resource, I should be able to branch off and install a various methods of watering my landscape at will. Maybe even a mister for the pool area.
Just curious if you have made any progress, this tread started my madness! Will probably be a mixture of SX and Propeller boards that control the system.
Comments
Jim
In the house I lived in 3 years ago, I had lightning hits twice and both times it blew the controller, power supply, X10 stuff, etc. off the wall and left black marks where they used to be. At my new home all the control cables go through a junction box right outside my home. I had purchased some gas-discharge arrestors and was planning on locating them there; and hopefully stop the high voltage PRIOR to entering the home.
Also, on this controller I take suction of the water from the lake, hence I will need a pump control circuit. I plan to treat it the same as a valve circuit (except the timing of course; it has to be on when any of the valves are programmed to come on) and then add a relay at the pump with a 24 VAC coil and large enough contacts to handle the 2 HP pump. Thoughts?
Jim
Thus we may want to add the following to the design:
1) A·"pump switch"·that can be used to control a relay that powers the pump.· This would power up when it needed to irrigate the lawn and power down when it doesn't need it.··The problem I see with this design is that the pump may be used for things other than irrigation (i.e. wash the car or household water).· In that case you would not be able to use that feature. .... Hmmm. I guess if it were just to was the car you could put a manual override on it to leave the pump on for an hour or so (depends·how clean you want your car!)·
2) One of the pins on the SX could also be connected to a water pressure sensor.· The SX would constantly monitor the pressure while the pump switch was active.· If the pressure dropped below a point for more than a minute it would deactivate the pump relay and sleep for one hour and try again.
3) The lightning problem does concern me though.· If I were using just a $30 home depot sprinkler I would risk it.· But here we are talking about a serious amount of hand assembled electronics that would be a pain to replace..... I need to do more research on this.· Jim, how much were those gas-discharge arrestors and where do you get them?
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John J. Couture
San Diego Miramar College
Any new updates on your design? This is a great thread, with lots of good info on Triacs. I'd hate to see the thread die out.
Russ
Anyway, gang, here is to a successful 2008!
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John J. Couture
San Diego Miramar College
John,
I'm sure your probably busy working with your "Embedded Computer Programming and Design class", but any updates on this project?
I'm working on something similar (sprinkler, lighting, and data acquisition system) however my water valves will be addressable using a half duplex RS485 network. I've installed a 1" water loop and an electrical conduit containing a cat 5 cable and a 3 conductor 16 gauge cable around my home. Still landscaping so I don't have a definite plan for my sprinkler system. But with the above resource, I should be able to branch off and install a various methods of watering my landscape at will. Maybe even a mister for the pool area.
Just curious if you have made any progress, this tread started my madness! Will probably be a mixture of SX and Propeller boards that control the system.
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Mike